The judges heard arguments in a legal standoff that could ultimately reach the Supreme Court.
Washington — A three-judge federal appeals court panel weighing whether former President Donald Trump can shield his White House records from the House committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol appeared skeptical of Mr. Trump’s claims of executive privilege on Tuesday, the latest development in a legal standoff that could ultimately reach the Supreme Court. Mr. Trump in October in an attempt to stop the National Archives from handing over certain documents, arguing his White House records are protected under executive privilege, the legal doctrine that shields some internal executive branch material from congressional scrutiny. President Biden his predecessor’s claim and permitted the National Archives to comply with the House committee’s request for the documents. During Tuesday’s virtual hearing, attorneys for Mr. Trump argued the federal courts are the proper venue for settling the dispute between the current and former presidents. But Judges Patricia Millett, Robert Wilkins and Ketanji Brown Jackson of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit questioned whether they have a role in ruling on Mr. Trump’s claims of executive privilege if the current president has already waived that right. “This all boils down to who decides,” Jackson told Mr. Trump’s attorney, Jesse Binnall. “Is it the current occupant of the White House or the former?” “Why should the former president be the one to make that determination?” she asked, to which Binnall answered that it is “incumbent on the courts” to make the decision if there is disagreement between a former and an incumbent president over executive privilege claims.
